Ste. Genevieve hosts "The Way We Worked"

STE. GENEVIEVE, MO (KRCU) - Ste. Genevieve is the first city in Missouri to host a Smithsonian exhibit entitled "The Way We Worked."

The multi-media exhibit includes photographs, large graphics, audio and artifacts that examine the role of work in the American consciousness.

Stephanie Bell is Ste. Genevieve’s Director of Tourism.

"It's an overview of how work and work ethic has impacted America over the past one hundred years and how it has changed, and it has gone through some major changes, and you can see that clearly through the exhibit," Bell said.

Each community that hosts the exhibit will add to it by contributing their own scrapbook about work in the local region. Bell says the scrapbook will then go on to become a part of the permanent exhibit.

The exhibit is funded by the Missouri Humanities Council and Smithsonian Institution.

The locations for this exhibit include the Welcome Center and Linden House. "The Way We Worked" runs through November 5th.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

Photo by James Earl Westcott. Courtesy of Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service

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Cab Calloway Orchestra coming to River Campus

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - Southeast Missouri State University’s River Campus touring series will kick off with the Cab Calloway Orchestra this Friday.

The orchestra is directed by Calloway Brooks, the grandson of legendary band leader Cab Calloway. He will bring the orchestra’s jazzy, upbeat sounds to the Bedell Performance Hall stage.

Ellen Farrow is the River Campus box office manager.

"We’re about 50% sold, a little over 400 tickets. Normally with this economy, everybody waits until the last minute, so we have plenty available for the public to purchase," Farrow said.

The Bedell Performance Hall’s capacity is 900. Tickets can be purchased at the River Campus box office.

Lauren Campbell and Jacob McCleland, KRCU

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Perryville school installs biomass thermal energy system

PERRYVILLE, MO (KRCU) - Six schools in Southern Missouri will soon operate new biomass thermal energy heating systems.

The Missouri Department of Conservation provides the grants for the Missouri Fuels for Schools project.

Perry County 32 School District received one of the systems. Superintendent Kevin Dunn expects savings between $25 to $30 dollars per year, starting this winter.

"It’s great for the economy for the jobs, but also great for our local school district to have this nice new furnace that’s going to save us money long term but also each year by saving on natural gas and it’s very little expense to the local district almost the entire project was paid by federal grants," Dunn said.

The grant is funded by the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA) and administrated by the U.S Forest Service.

Missouri Fuels for Schools Project Coordinator Peter Maki says the system’s technology gives the ability to burn wood at efficiencies that are equal to or succeed natural gas efficiencies.

"You have an auger that pulls the wood chips from a chip room onto conveyor and then onto other conveyors and otters that automatically as you call for heat, all this is computer controlled so the chips are then augered into the combuster," Maki said.

This program plans to find funding and continue a Fuel for Schools program throughout Missouri.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Southeast Missouri Symphony Orchestra presents "Symphony Sampler"

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - The Southeast Missouri Symphony Orchestra will present a “Symphony Sampler” this Sunday.

The “Symphony Sampler” will provide a brief, informative and entertaining preview of the upcoming season of symphony orchestra concerts.

Sara Edgerton is the director of the orchestra and program. She says the program is a great family event.

"The symphony sampler is kinda of a short preview concert," Edgerton said. "We will be playing selections of music that will be featured in concerts through the year here ahead at the river campus. The sampler gives audiences a chance to hear a short selection of a variety of the music will be performing in 2011 and 2012."

The audience will have the opportunity to purchase individual or season tickets to the symphony.

The concert will be held in the Shuck Recital Hall at the River Campus. It is free and open to public at two pm.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Volunteers count chimney swifts at St. Vincent's Catholic Church

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - The Missouri Department of Conservation hosted a program to help count chimney swifts Tuesday night. 

This event was part of a nationwide research project. It was held at St. Vincent’s Catholic Church in Cape Girardeau.

This project helps by collecting counts of swifts across the United States. Counts are used to track birds’ migration patterns and keep a record of the chimney swift population.

Bob Gillespe is a natural history biologist for the MDC. He says the birds are declining across their range because of different habitat change. That is why “Swift Night Out” takes place.

"Each year we conduct a swift night out and we come out and monitor chimney swifts populations in different chimneys that they utilize for their migration and basically we’re just getting an assessment of the number of birds using the chimney here at St. Vincents school," he said.

The Department hopes the event helped get people involved and educated about chimney swifts.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

Photo courtesy of Audubon Minnesota.

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Southeast's Special Collections and Archives Center digitilizes Civil War artifacts

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - Southeast Missouri State University’s Special Collections and Archives Center wants to document and digitilize the whereabouts of letters, journals, diaries, photos, and other original documents from the Civil War.

The project’s manager is Ellen Ryan. She says documents, artifacts and photos will be digitized and placed onto a website so that educators, the general public, researchers and students have access to these resources.

"A lot of it is to kinda take the information that is out there put it in to one location so it is accessible to people," Ryan says.

Partners include the Cape Girardeau County Archive Center and the Special Collections Research Center at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale.

The project will be similar to a similar endeavor that is already completed in Springfield, Missouri.

The process started three weeks ago and will continue until mid July of next year.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Enrollment grows at Cape Girardeau Partnership for Higher Education

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - Enrollment continues to grow at the Cape Girardeau Partnership for Higher Education (CGPHE).

The program is now entering its second year. It’s a partnership between Mineral Area College, Southeast Missouri State University and Three Rivers Community College.

CGPHE’s Tinea Ortega says enrollment has spiked sharply this semester.

"For fall when we started out, our first number was about 190," Ortega said. "In spring we actually increased, so were about 210 during Spring and summer, we had about 60 for summer and then this fall we have peaked at about 283 students."

CGPHE services ten school districts and provides the first two years of general education programs, mainly students who want to transfer to Southeast.

Its facilities are located at the Cape Girardeau Career & Technology Center.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Southeast student darts rhinos for internship

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - Southeast Missouri State University student Hollie Lybarger traveled to South Africa this summer as an intern for Madikwe Game Reserve.

The internship consists of things such as learning methods of protecting vulnerable species, helping with predator work, tracking jackals and clearing invasive bush species.

Lybarger says she also worked as part of a rhino tagging team.

"We actually tracked down both black and white rhino and darted them and we took blood samples, hair samples, tissue samples, we also drilled a tracking device in side the horn and then notched their ears for identification and awareness purposes," Lybarger said.

The tracking devices are used to prevent poaching.

Lybarger says this internship has taught her about land preservation and wildlife management as well as educating the public about such issues.

She is considering graduate school and plans to use her degree in land management.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Southeast student discovers shipwreck

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - Southeast Missouri State University student Jennifer Rickard made the discovery of a lifetime during a summer program in Spain: the remains of a shipwreck deep in the Mediterranean waters.

Rickard was studying at the Cavalleria Ecomuseum when she and six other divers made the discovery.

The ship dates to the sixteenth or seventeenth century and was badly charred by fire.

Rickard says she was not expecting to find a shipwreck that day.

'They had told us to due magnitronomy and also some other indications that there possibly was one in that area, we did end up discovering it through a mass amount of dead seaweed that had been underneath us," Rickard said.

Jennifer was granted a scholarship from the Harryette Campbell Foundation to help fund the program.

Rickard's says she hopes to continue studying maritime archaeology for her masters and PhD.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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MAC receives EPA training grant

PARK HILLS, MO (KRCU) - Mineral Area College is the recipient of a $190,000 grant to provide lead contamination cleanup training.

It’s part of the Environmental Protection Agency’s remediation project in St. Francois County.

Program Director Doug Lawson says training will be offered for four groups of twenty four individuals who want to work on environmental cleanup projects. Lawson says the contamination comes from St. Francois county’s days as a lead mining powerhouse.

"Unfortunately there wasn’t much regulation and the communities were left with contaminated materials spread throughout," Lawson says. "It’s just been known to cause developmental problems in younger children. Its been tested so they want to remove it to keep them from having access on something that could cause developmental damage to them in a young stage of life."

The application deadline is September 9th for the first of four training programs. Training will run between September 26th to October 6th.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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Southeast receives grants from Missouri Arts Council

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KRCU) - The Missouri Arts Council awarded nearly $40,000 in grant funding to Southeast Missouri State University.

The money will go towards the Symphony Orchestra concert series, a traveling exhibit at the Crisp Museum and the “Big Muddy” literary journal. The funds will also bring guests artists for the department of Theatre and Dance Production of Hamlet and to fund the residency of a guest choreographer.

Over fifteen thousand dollars will support the symphony. Artistic director Sara Edgerton says the funds will help bring first class talent to the River Campus.

"“This grant we wrote for this symphony series will enable to bring in some really great guest artists not only to perform with the symphony, but also to do master classes and outreach activities in the community," Edgerton says.”

Guest artists for the symphony orchestra include Mark O’Connor and Allen Vizzutti.

Lauren Campbell, KRCU

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